



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM 
THE BROWNINGS 



BY 

AMORY H. BRADFORD, D.D. 

Author of 

*' Spirit and Life," "Heredity and Christian Problems," "The 

Growing Revelation," etc. 



NEW YORK 

THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. 

PUBLISHERS 



2.^"^ 






15671 



Library of CorKiress 

Two Copies Received 
JUL 7 1900 

Copyright enitiy 

SECOND COPY. 

Of-liveirtl \(\ 

ORDLR DIVISION, 

AUG 3 1900 






Copyright, 1900, 
Bv TuoMAfe Y. Ckoweli. <<t Company, 



i SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE 
BROWNINGS 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE 
BROWNINGS. 



I. REVELATION BY LIFE. 

A lesson from Robert Broivning. 

The noblest and most inspiring religious teachers in 
all ages and lands have conveyed their messages through 
the medium of poetry. Theology always runs in a pro- 
saic mould ; ethics is very likely to take the form of 
apothegm ; but the truth which inspires, which is the 
result of vision rather than of reasoning, usually finds 
poetic expression. The greatest of the prophets and the 
most persuasive of the preachers have all been poets ; 
but all poets have not been preachers and prophets. 
The earliest manifestations of religious feeling are poems, 
like the hymns of the Vedas. The Hebrew prophets 
were all sublime poets. Sometimes their visions were 
voiced in the Hebrew parallelisms, and sometimes in 
prose-poems, but both vision and diction were always of 
the nature of poetry. It is possible to go a step farther and 
to say that most great poets have been profoundly relig- 
ious. Dante, Milton, Wordsworth, Tennyson, the Brown- 
ings, and Whittier were all in the truest sense prophets. 
If any in these modern centuries have uttered the truth 
of God in enduring words, they have been such authors 
as these, no " idle singers of an empty day,'' but " min- 
strels who walked the earth with their singing robes 

5 



6 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

around them." They have been voices for the Spirit. 
The message of no prophet ever rang more truly to the 
music of love to God and man than do the songs of 
Whittier; no teacher has spoken more clearly of the 
immortal life and " the eternal hope " than Tennyson ; 
the apostle John was not more intensely and nobly 
mystical than was Eobert Browning ; and no prophetess 
or Sibyl was ever more evidently filled with a divine 
passion than was Mrs. Browning. 

In this little book I shall endeavor to emphasize two 
or three of the many spiritual lessons which the Brown- 
ings have taught the world. My object is not a study 
of these poets as religious teachers. That would require 
a volume of more imposing proportions, for one of them 
was a profoundly mystical theologian, and the other was 
an intensely practical preacher. My purpose is exposi- 
tion rather than investigation. 

Among the poems of Bobert Browning is one which 
may be called an echo of the sermon on Mars Hill. 
" Cleon " is a supposed letter from a Greek poet, artist, 
and philosopher to his patron king. It begins with a 
recognition of the munificence and nobility of Protus, 
who had sent rich gifts to Cleon. Evidently in response 
to some inquiry of his king, Cleon recites his own 
achievements as a poet, painter, and architect ; and this 
leads to the thought that he could not claim all the credit 
for his skill as an artist, but that it was the fruit of long 
ages of discipline and growth in others. Very quickly 
he comes to what the blind poet-preacher of Scotland, Dr. 
George Mathewson, has called the distinctive character- 
istic of all religions, viz., their teaching concerning in- 
carnation. To this well-nigh universal faith Browning 
represents Cleon as giving expression in the following 
lines : 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 7 

" Long since I imaged, wrote the fiction out, 
That he [Zeus] or other God descended here, 
And, once for all, showed simultaneously 
What, in its nature, never can be shown 
Piecemeal, or in succession ; showed, I say, 
The worth, both absolute and relative. 
Of all his children from the birth of time, 
His instruments for all appointed Avork." 

This passage, in which Browning represents a pagan 
as dimly anticipating the incarnation in Jesus Christ, 
has scriptural expression in the Gospel of John — " And 
the word became flesh and dwelt among us." Cleon 
imagined that God had descended to the earth. Men 
have always and everywhere desired a manifested God. 
That desire, in almost all lands, has sooner or later as- 
sumed the proportions of faith. The two great mystics, 
the apostle John and Robert Browning, are in entire har- 
mony at this point. " Only the good discerns the good," 
says Mrs. Browning; and we paraphrase it and say, 
" Only God discerns God." 

If God is to be known by us He must reveal Himself 
to us; when He does this there is that in all men 
which recognizes Him. There is never any difficulty 
in determining what things belong to God and what to 
man. The stars are God's work ; the frescoes in a cathe- 
dral are man's work. Flowers are from the hands of God ; 
imitations in wax and glass are made by man. Forests 
every autumn burn with the glory of God ; houses are 
erected by man. In other words, we easily distinguish 
some things as human products and others as from 
a divine author. You find this idea of a Deity reveal- 
ing himself in the poems of Homer and in the hymns 
of the Vedas. Browning's pagan was not the only 
one who has dreamed that God descended. To this ex- 



8 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

pectancy in humaiiity He comes, aud is recognized 
as God. However much some may insist that Jesus 
Christ was only human, they never deny that His es- 
sential spiritual characteristics were those of the Deity. 
^^ No one by searching has found out God.'' We cannot 
find Him, but we may recognize Him. Is it reasonable 
to suppose that all men would be created with facul- 
ties for discerning the Divine, and never be given an 
opportunity for using them ? Eobert Browning teaches 
that the ^' desire of all nations " became reality in the 
Christian revelation in Jesus Christ — the supreme 
and only adequate disclosure of Deity in terms of human 
life. 

But we are hardly more ignorant concerning Deity 
than concerning ourselves ; and yet we can never know 
ourselves by studying ourselves. We may learn some- 
thing of what we are at one period of time, but we can- 
not learn what we were intended to be. If you find a 
thousand pieces of china scattered by the roadside you 
have no conception of the beauty of a K-oyal Worcester 
vase. If you study those pieces separately you may 
discover that they are fragments of something artistic, but 
you must see the whole vase before you will have a vision 
of " the thing of beauty." Likewise if we would know 
what we are ideally, we must have before our eyes some- 
thing besides our own poor experience, with our failures, 
mistakes, weaknesses, and often wilful wrong-doing. 
If we study ourselves we see fragments of manhood, or, 
at best, manhood unfinished ; we do not see ourselves in 
our possibilities and ideal relations. 

If a man ever knows himself he must be permitted to 
see — if we may so speak — the plan according to which 
he was made. And if we ever know God He must 
condescend to our limitations and within them reveal 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FBOM THE BROWNINGS. 9 

Himself. If we ever know ourselves, our ideal selves must 
come to our actual selves in a form the reality of which 
cannot be doubted. Cleon seems to have grasped this fact. 
The God who, to his imagination, " descended " showed 
" simultaneously," that is, all at once, what could never 
have been understood if the truth had been given " piece- 
meal." The illustration of the vase will help us once 
more. If one piece of china and then another are ex- 
amined the beauty of the whole design will never be 
appreciated. For that the -peviect vase must be seen. 
And so one noble desire, another holy aspiration, another 
heroic act, will never make plain what we were really 
intended to be ; the whole plan must needs be disclosed. 
And then we are related to beings above us and to other 
beings around us. The lines which connect us with 
persons and things above and around run away into 
darkness. Who shall tell whither they lead ? We 
have never yet been able to reach far into the mysteries j 
they elude discovery ; they are objects for revelation. 
Jesus Christ was a man, and yet a true Son of God. 
He was the typical man, what we were intended to be, 
and what we will be when time and discipline have done 
their work. He was also brother to all men : He entered 
fully and sympathetically into the human condition, and 
this shows that our true relation to our fellow-men is 
that of brothers. These simple truths could not be 
made plain in words : they required to be expressed in 
terms of life. Brotherhood even now is regarded, by 
many, as an iridescent dream ; but no one fails to ap- 
preciate a warm-hearted, generous, self-denying brother. 
We speak of God ; but our eyes have never seen Him, 
our ears have never heard Him, we cannot find Him, 
but He may come to us and make himself known. The 
"heathen" hoped that He would do this; the Chris- 



10 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

tian says: "He has done it." Jesus Christ is the ideal 
man, and therefore all the revelation of God and of the 
perfected race that it is possible for our poor faculties to 
compass. This Robert Browning teaches. 

Cleon dreamed of a God who would use men as instru- 
ments for all appointed work. That, also, is a thought 
which is of the substance of the Christian revelation. 
Jesus taught that all men were intended to be what He 
was. Behind this teaching there is a profound philoso- 
phy, since all that the world will know about Deity must 
come through man, or at least through something human. 
If God has a special speech of His own, in His inter- 
course with men He must lay it aside and use our lan- 
guage, because we cannot understand anything which is 
not human. Therefore men are the vehicles of all reve- 
lations to men. The Bible is the word of God in so far 
as that word could be written in a book, but only a 
small part of it could be thus written. Divine revelation 
has to submit to human limitations. Whatever is re- 
vealed of God, of the spiritual spheres, of the divine will, 
must be through the media of thought, words, deeds, or 
character, and these have no existence apart from human 
beings. Man is the organ ; the wind is from above, and 
inspiration and revelation are the music which results 
when the divine breath fills the human faculties ; but the 
human faculties are as essential as the divine breath. 

Men are God's agents in all inspiration. By inspira- 
tion I mean not only the passion and vision of Isaiah, 
Paul, and John, but all that leads others to think great 
thoughts and undertake noble enterprises. General Gor- 
don was inspired in his wonderful achievements in 
China ; and when almost single-handed he withstood his 
murderers in the desert until his death at Khartoum. 
Abraham Lincoln and Alexander of Russia were divinely 



SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 11 

guided to emancipate millions of slaves. rCaphael, when 
he painted the " Madonna '' and the " Transfiguration," 
was as truly inspired by the Almighty as John when 
he wrote the Apocalypse. All heroic endeavor shows 
traces of divine inspiration. Milton wrote '^ Paradise 
Lost," Coleridge his " Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale 
of Chamouni," Browning his " Cleon," Beethoven his 
sonatas, and Angelo and Murillo painted their angels 
and their saints, as they were moved by the spirit of 
God. When our Father would multiply pictures of the 
glory of nature and man He brings artists into being ; 
when He would fill the world with music He pours into 
elect souls the echoes of heavenly harmonies ; when He 
would thrill men with song He gives to poets the vision 
and the utterance divine. Cleon truly says, " Men are 
His instruments for all appointed work." 

All divine purposes for men are achieved through 
men. When hoary evils are to be overthrown reformers 
are raised up like Luther and Knox. Whirlwinds never 
sweep away corrupt institutions, neither do they often 
fall of themselves, but a few men have clear sight and 
heroic courage, and these, seeing the evils which imperil 
the common weal, attack and destroy them. The prisons 
of Europe were made to approach decency through the 
etforts of John Howard — a man so full of holy love 
that it ran over in sacrificing service. Florence Night- 
ingale revolutionized the war-hospitals of Europe and 
thus immensely diminished the horrors of war ; and she 
was only God's servant. 

Sometimes, probably, the Divine Spirit moves directly 
on human spirits, but, usually, if men are to be saved 
some man must take to them the Word of Life. Blood- 
less and impalpable propositions never helped the race 
one step upward. Salvation is by man. Instead of 



12 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

silent influences from the invisible, missionaries have 
taken the Gospel to their fellow-men, and not infre- 
quently the truth would have been meaningless without 
the messenger. 

Municipal abuses are corrected by no Pentecostal 
miracles. The wind may drive away the clouds and the 
sun burn up vapors, but it required Octavia Hill and 
John Kuskin to start the movement to secure better 
dwellings for the poor of London; and Arnold Toynbee 
and those who have come after him were needed to take 
the life of the universities to the slums of Whitechapel 
and the East Side of New York. The holy city may 
descend out of heaven from God, but its walls will be 
garnished by those who have learned their craft in the 
school of earthly experience. 

As evils are to be reformed ; as the Holy Gospel is to 
be preached ; as better social conditions are to be created 
by men, so also comfort and peace are to reach the deepest 
individual needs through human agencies. The Apoca- 
lypse contains hints of a time when God will wipe away 
all tears, and bind up broken hearts. Did it ever occur 
to you that God's way of wiping away tears and binding 
up hearts that are broken is by human hands ? or that 
the process has already begun ? It is going on even 
now, not by the direct touch of the Almighty, but by 
means of the soft palms and loving influences of those 
whom we call brother and sister, father and mother, lover 
and friend. This also is worthy of emphasis. There will 
never be peace among the nations until there is peace 
among individuals ; and there will be peace among men 
only as those who have vision and strength minister to 
those who have not. The better days are surely com- 
ing ; evil will be overthrown ; the Word of Life will 
reach into all lands; Hope in morning robes will drive 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 13 

despair into the outer darkness ; civilization and brother- 
hood will take the places of barbarism and selfishness ; 
tears and sorrow will disappear, and all this will be 
achieved by the love in human hearts, the music in 
human voices, and the strength of human arms. But 
now the question, at once practical and personal, arises 
and presses for an answer : If God does His Avork 
through human beings, are we worthy to be used by Him ? 
If He should desire our help in destroying evil, are our 
hearts pure enough, and our lives holy enough, for a ser- 
vice so transcendent ? If He would have us speak of 
Christ to others, will they see Him in us ? If words of 
comfort and peace are needed by those whose eyes are 
filled with tears, and whose hearts are breaking with 
sorrow, are we sympathetic and genuine enough for so 
holy a ministry ? 

These are some of the thoughts suggested as we study 
one brief passage from Robert Browning's " Cleon," and 
go back of the poem to the Scripture on which it is 
founded, and read of the Word made flesh, who dwelt on 
the earth, full of grace and truth. The "desire of all 
nations " is realized in God revealed not " piecemeal " or 
"in succession," but "simultaneously," in the perfect 
Man who is the type of all men and who has shown that 
all are God's " instruments for all appointed work." 

II. THE SECRET OF SERVICE. 
A Lesson from Mrs. Browning. 

The truths which I have traced in Eobert Brown- 
ing's "Cleon" find equally vivid though far different 
expression in the works of Mrs. Browning. The hus- 
band was speculative and philosophical; the wife was 
intense and practical. The husband wrote as one who 



14 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

had a mystery to be solved; the wife as one who had 
discerned the only way in which a difficulty might be 
overcome ; and both alike as those who had learned that 
the revelation of God in terms of humanity throws the 
only light on the human problem which is really 
luminous. 

Leigh Hunt called Elizabeth Barrett Browning " Ten- 
nyson's sister." Some one else has called her " Shake- 
speare's daughter." She was, I think, the greatest 
poetess who has ever lived. It has been said that she 
had ^' a soul of fire in a body of pearl." No one was ever 
more sensitive to sorrow and pain. She was like a harp, 
and responded to the slightest breath of aspiration or of 
suffering. Her song was strong, clear, and sometimes 
terribly intense; again, it was soft and sweet as love 
itself. It was pervaded with trust in God and confi- 
dence in the triumph of His kingdom. Concerning her 
religious faith, Mrs. Browning wrote to Leigh Hunt, " I 
believe in the divinity of Christ in the intensest sense, 
that He was God absolutely. But for the rest, I am 
very unorthodox about the spirit, the flesh, and the 
devil."' Among her poems the longest is "Aurora 
Leigh," which is at once a novel, a social study, a poem, 
and a glorious hymn to pure love. It has been called by 
Taine the greatest long poem in the language — greater 
even than " Paradise Lost." Others have regarded it as 
crude, unfinished, extravagant. I think it is one of the 
few really great poems of our English literature, and 
that means of the world's literature. Aurora was the 
daughter of a Florentine mother and an English father. 
In her childhood she was brought, an orphan, to England, 
to live with an aunt who was critically formal and pre- 
cise, and who little understood the impulsive girl who 

1 Memoirs, p. xxxv. 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 15 

loved beauty, and into whose soul had already gone the 
tenderness of Italian skies and the sweetness of Italian 
flowers. In that home was a cousin who in due time 
loved Aurora, or dreamed that he did ; but he was absorbed 
with social schemes and wanted a wife to help him in his 
work. The proud and splendid woman loved in return, 
but would have no such love as was offered to her. They 
separated — Romney Leigh oppressed by the weight of 
the world's misery, and thinking that Providence was 
dependent for its alleviation on him ; Aurora to dream 
her dreams and sing her songs, and to wait for her vindi- 
cation in the future. After ten years, chastened by 
many failures and deep sorrows, they once more told 
their love, and found that neither had ceased to long for 
the other. On this slender thread is strung wisdom, 
wondrous poetry, and truth profounder than philosophies 
often teach. Eomney, speaking of his work for the out- 
cast, says : 

'' But I, I sympathize with man, not God; 
I think I was a man for chiefly this : 
And when I stand beside a dying bed, 
It's death to me. . . 
And I, a man, as men are now, and not 
As men may be hereafter, feel with men 
In the agonizing present." 

Such identification with the sufferings of others is essen- 
tial to good work for humanity. He who does not feel 
another's sorrows as if they were his own can never do 
much in the way of-relief . But what motive is strong 
enough to inspire such identification with troubles not 
our own ? This is the answer : 

*•' The hungry beggar boy . . . 
Contains, himself, both flowers and firmaments, 
And surging seas and aspeetable stars, 



16 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

And all that we Avould push jjim out of sight 

In order to see nearer. Let us pray 

God's grace to keep God's image in repute." 

To see God's image in every man is to find inspiration 
for service that can never weary. Much effort at social 
amelioration is mere philanthropic dilettantism because 
persons are confused with things. Aurora held that the 
worst and weakest are children of God. 

The necessity of the incarnation in order that men may 
be reached and inspired with heavenly aspirations con- 
denses Mrs. Browning's philosophy and theology. 

"• 'T is impossible 
To get at men excepting through their souls, 
However open their carnivorous jaAvs ; 
The soul 's the way. Not even Christ himself 
Can save man else than as He holds man's soul ; 
And therefore did He come into our flesh, 
As some wise hunter creeping on his knees 
With a torch, into the blackness of some cave. 
To face and quell the beast there, — take the soul, 
And 80 possess the whole man, body and soul." 

I now quote the very heart of the poem as a social 
study : 

'■'• * The man most man, with tendereet human hands, 
Works best for men, — as God in Nazareth.' . . . 
■He paused upon the word, and then resumed : 
' Fewer programmes : we who have no prescience. 
Fewer systems : we who are held and do not hold. 
Less mapping out of masses, to be saved 
By nations, or by sexes. Fourier 's void. 
And Comte is dwarfed, — and Cabet puerile. 
Subsists no law of life outside of life ; 
No perfect manners without Christian souls : 
The Christ himself had been no Lawgiver, 
Unless He had given the life, too, with the law.'" 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 17 

These noble teachings concerning the methods by 
which the outcast and depraved are to be reached and 
uplifted are but an elaboration of the second chapter of 
Hebrews. " The man most man, with tenderest human 
hands, works best for men, — as God in Nazareth," — is 
an echo of earlier words. Mrs. Browning's social phil- 
osophy is identical with the theology of the New Tes- 
tament. It was necessary that the Saviour should be 
made like His brethren in order that He might show 
what humanity is destined to be. "God was in Christ;" 
and God in varying degrees is in all men. If we were 
what we might be, and may be in the long, long future, 
God would be in us, as He was in Jesus. 

Jesus said : " He that hath seen me hath seen the 
Father ; " the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
wrote : " It behooved Him in all things to be made like 
unto His brethren." In other words, it was God's 
duty to Himself to become man, for in no other way 
could He realize Himself. Man, not only one man, is 
designed to be the highest revelation of God. That 
means that Jesus Christ was the pattern of every 
"hungry beggar boy," every roue, and every tyrant 
with his foot on the divine image. Few of us have yet 
dreamed how far Christ's teaching goes; and, perhaps, 
still fewer are ready to receive doctrines so radical and 
revolutionary. 

What were we designed to be ? At this point Mrs. 
Browning is in agreement with her husband, only she 
expresses her views with more of intensity and passion. 
Jesus shows us in a human form what man must be when 
God possesses Him. God is love, and love manifests 
itself in service. He sees one blind, and can no more 
be prevented from opening those eyes than the sun 
from shining. He sees one burdened with guilt, and 



18 SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

can no more be kept from saying " Thy sins be forgiven 
thee" than the sun can be kept from burning up the 
mists. God is love, and when He has a large place in 
a man that man has a hand for ragged children, as Guth- 
rie had ; a head full of devices for the outcast poor, as 
Shaftesbury had ; a consuming desire for the emancipa- 
tion of the slaves, as Wilberf orce had ; a heart breaking 
for those in sin, as John Wesley had. In the most un- 
selfish and loving spirits we see hints of what humanity 
will sometime be. Jesus differs from other men in that 
He is as full a revelation of the divine as is possible in 
humanity. Every human being, according to ability and 
opportunity, may be a medium for the manifestation of 
God. And more than this — God has always been in 
humanity. Precisely as this truth is recognized are in- 
dividuals inspired to heroic and holy service. Who is 
that wretch wallowing in vice and drunkenness ? Who 
is that child in an environment which makes virtue im- 
possible ? Who is that woman shivering, alone, swal- 
lowing her tears, asking : " Which is more to be dreaded, 
the cold waters, or the colder hearts of those who will 
not see what is crushing me ? " Just as he is, that 
drunkard has something divine in him. In that dirty, 
boisterous boy is something which takes hold of Beth- 
lehem, Calvary, and the throne of God, and which is 
capable of endless growth. That woman stained and 
soiled has been w^ronged, crushed by the ones who ought 
to have protected her; she is an outcast from the social 
order, but she is the sister of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, 
the Son of God. The Psalmist cried: "Whither shall I 
flee from Thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, 
Thou art there : If I make my bed in hell, behold Thou 
art there. If I take the Avings of the morning and 
dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 19 

shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold 
me/' 

Jesus goes a step farther. He teaches that the God who 
is on the horizon of the sea, and in the abysses of the 
under world, is also in the depths of humanity ; that He 
is in all, white and black, good and bad, educated and 
ignorant, and that the cross is the only adequate hint of 
the worth of a man. This I hold to be a vital truth, and 
one greatly needing emphasis. There is a diamond " in 
every hungry beggar boy " and in every polluted wreck 
of manhood. Jesus in Himself is the revelation of what 
in some far-off time all may become ; He is the altitude 
which the race will reach in the fulness of the ages. 
"Alas, long-sufeering and most patient God, 
Thou need'st be surelier God to bear with us 
Than even to have made us ! Thou aspire, aspire 
From henceforth for me ! Thou who hast thyself 
Endured this fleshhood, knowing how, as a soaked 
And sucking vesture, it would drag us down 
And choke us in the melancholy Deep, 
Sustain me, that, with thee, I walk these waves 
Resisting ! breathe me upward, thou for me 
Aspiring, who art the way, the truth, the life — 
That no truth henceforth seem indifferent. 
No way to truth laborious, and no life, 
Not even this I live, intolerable." 

No one who is great in power alone can get near 
enough to suffering human hearts to inspire them with 
aspirations for holiness. Why is a mother sympathetic ? 
Because her child is part of her very self. She car- 
ries its griefs as her own, and has travelled the way 
along which her loved one is walking. Who are the 
most helpful in sorrow ? Always those who have suf- 
fered. " My heart is breaking — who are you that you 
presume to advise me ? " ^^ But, my friend, I have been 



20 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

where you are myself ; last year I lost my fortune ; six 
months ago I buried my wife ; three months ago I laid 
my little one by her mother's side. I am all alone and 
poor, and I want to tell you that T have found these words 
divinely true : ' He hath borne our griefs and carried our 
sorrows.' " Community in sorrow opens the door at 
once. " Come in, my brother. Show me the secret of 
your peace." Precisely because our elder Brother has 
been where we are, and knows all the way in which we 
move, He has attraction and inspiration for us. 

Doubts, like clouds from the nether abyss, sweep into 
our horizon, and we cry, " If God is, I cannot find Him ; 
if forgiveness is possible, I cannot realize it ; if life is 
anything but mockery, I cannot understand it." In the 
midst of our perplexity two liien come to us. One says : 
" You ought to put away those doubts. You are deny- 
ing the Saviour who died for you." The other says : 
"Be patient, my brother, I have had experiences like 
yours. Do not do anything rash ; wait to be led. I 
know there is no gloom more terrible than yours, for I 
have been in the same cloud ; but by and by the light will 
dawn. Be sure of one thing — if there is a God, and you 
are really seeking Him, He will not allow you to fail 
of finding Him." Which of these will be the more likely 
to help us ? If God is to command our wills, dispel our 
griefs, and save us from our sins He must show that He 
appreciates our difficulties. This the Christian revela- 
tion teaches that He has done : " He was made perfect 
through suffering." He was so hungry that He was 
tempted to turn stones into bread ; so poor that He had 
no house in which to sleep ; He lost friends by death ; 
He was whipped until His back ran blood ; He hung all 
day with nails driven through His quivering flesh ; He 
was misunderstood, abused, lied about, and thus, having 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 21 

been made " like unto His brethren," He was fitted to be 
not only their sympathizing friend, but their Saviour. 
'^ Son of God, was ever grief like thine ? " When the 
dark days come, as come they sometime will, you will 
realize how divine is the music which eclioes among the 
ruins of your life, as you catch the accents of these sacred 
words, "He hath borne our griefs. ... In all their afflic- 
tions He was afflicted." '^ But when I seek to be faithful 
to truth, as I see it, I am met by abuse and shame ; it is 
enough to discourage any one." Yes, but death did not 
shake His loyalty to truth. " I try to help others, and 
for love hate is returned." Yes, and so it was with Him 
who prayed for those who drove the nails. " I am 
utterly crushed by disappointment and anxiety, and no 
one cares." Yes, some one cares. He who is a man of 
sorrows and acquainted with grief. He cares. I have 
been interested to observe that this truth of the sympa- 
thizing God appeals to men quite as much as to women. 
Perhaps it is because they have quite as much need of 
sympathy. A man's solitude sometimes seems more 
desolate than a woman's, possibly because he is less sen- 
sitive to the reality of the Unseen. 

There is a God of all comfort because there has first 
been a long-suffering and compassionate God. The real- 
ization of this fact is the coronation of the human expe- 
rience. Because she appreciated this so intensely Mrs. 
Browning was able to write, in " De Prof undis," 

' '• And having in thy life-depth thrown 
Being and suffering (which are one). 
As a child drops his pebble small 
Down some deep well, and hears it fall 
Smiling, so I. Thy days go on." 

This world is to be saved by life. "The man mosi; 
man, with tenderest human hands, works best for men, 



22 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS, 

— as God in Nazareth." And how did God work in Naza- 
reth ? By getting for Himself a lodgement in one per- 
fect human heart and then living divinely within human 
limitations. " Fewer programmes/' " fewer systems." 

" Subsists no law of hfe outside of life ; 
No perfect manners without Christian souls : 
The Christ Himself had been no Lawgiver, 
Unless He had given the life, too, with the law." 

For weary ages philosophers had tried to solve the 
problems of misery, sin, and death ; many plans for in- 
dividual and social improvement had been devised, and 
as the result of the long process of speculation most 
thinkers had come to believe that the mysteries were in- 
soluble ; that the best that any could do was to get 
through the world with as little trouble to themselves 
and as little annoyance to others as possible. Then 
Jesus Christ came with his new method of salvation by 
life. His plan was to impart His life to others. He se- 
lected a dozen workingmen, kept them with Him until 
they had something of His spirit and vision ; told them 
to do to others as He had done to them, and then closed 
His career by being put to death for loyalty to His great 
love. When compared with our ways of attempting 
large enterprises His plan seems stupendous absurdity ; 
but how magnificently it has worked ! One life touched 
other lives with its vitality and power; brooded over 
them until they were ready to do the same to others ; 
they reached still others and imparted to them what they 
had received, and the process has gone on ever since. 
The history of Christianity is the history of the growth 
of the divine life into human lives and human society. 
An unknown Jew landed in Europe and began a move- 
ment which, quickly, was too big for Him to compass. He 



SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BUOWNINGS. 23 

preached to a few, but His words had wings. Many heard 
them and read them, and they in turn repeated the mes- 
sage, and sped it along until the map of the civilized world 
was changed. This is the miracle of miracles. An appar- 
ently unknown, uneducated Jewish peasant, who, after 
a short, ignominious career was executed as a criminal, 
has become the centre and inspiration of a movement 
which is filling the earth with light and love. The sun 
rose on the world when Jesus was born. Where He is 
followed mercy and justice walk hand in hand ; where He 
is worshipped pure homes and gentle service make do- 
mestic life beautiful ; where His words are heeded death 
loses its depressing and bewildering power. The Incar- 
nation teaches that God's method of salvation is by life. 
We may try to trace the movements of life, but it is as 
independent of our theories as tropical vines are of trel- 
lises. We may think to shut it within some holy sym- 
bol, but it will break in pieces the symbol as a growing 
seed will split a rock. It is life that men need, the 
touch of living sympathy, the thrill of heavenly hope, 
inspiration to noble service, the vision of eternal possi- 
bilities, and this life always comes from above. We need 
not more sermons, but more men so genuine that lies 
will not stick to them. Not arguments for Christianity, 
but men in business and women in society pure as light, 
sympathetic as love, honest as truth, human as Christ, 
are the means by which this world is to be saved. 

" It behooved Him in all things to be made like unto 
His brethren." 

'' The man most man, with tenderest human hands, 
Works best for men, — as God in Nazareth." 

Humanity has in it something divine; therefore no 
service for man is lost. 



24 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

All who have sinned and all who have suffered may 
see in Jesus Christ what they were intended to be, and 
in Him they may see also the sympathy and sacrifice of 
God. 

The divine method of saving the world is by the im- 
partation of life, and the growth of the kingdom of God 
is the growth of that life into the hearts and lives of 
men. 

Mrs. Browning's faith in the reality of the incarnation 
was the result of her intense sensitiveness to the sor- 
rows of humanity. Her sympathy was the prophecy of 
the victory of the love and compassion which she dis- 
cerned at the heart of the universe. To her practical 
mind the ideas of God and of the better time for the race 
were inseparably bound together. She could not even 
imagine a Deity who would not reveal Himself to His 
children crying in the darkness to know " wherefore they 
were born." 

If this subject were always approached from the side 
of human need, rather than from that of speculation^ 
there would be few who would not reach Mrs. Browning's 
conclusions. 

III. HALF TRUTHS AXD THE TRUTH. 

A Lesson from Robert Browning. 

I PROPOSE in this chapter to consider a subject which 
is suggested with about equal emphasis in Eobert Brown- 
ing's " Cleon " and in Paul's sermon on Mars Hill. Paul 
was in Athens. About him were the remnants of the 
most wonderful civilization the world had seen. He 
was surrounded by descendants of philosophers, poets, 
artists. In full view were the Acropolis and Parthenon. 
Socrates had walked those streets, and under whispering 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 25 

trees near by Plato had led his disciples. In sight of 
the place where he stood may have been some of the 
creations of Phidias ; and certainly those very walls had 
echoed with the impassioned appeals of Demosthenes and 
the polished periods of Pericles. Among such scenes 
Paul found an altar with the inscription : " To an un- 
known god," and by a reference to it began his address 
on Mars Hill. 

There were several such altars in that city. Their 
origin is not known. " It is related that Epimenides put 
an end to a plague, and therefore one may find at Athens 
altars without the designation of a god by name. From 
this particular instance the general view may be derived 
that, on important occasions, when reference to a god 
known by name was wanting, as in public calamities of 
which no definite god could be assigned as the author, in 
order to honor or propitiate the god concerned by sacri- 
fice, without lighting on a wrong one, altars were erected 
which were destined and designated ' To an unknown 
god.' " ' 

The beginning of the sermon on Mars Hill was a 
recognition that there was an element of truth in pagan- 
ism. Paul went directly to the reality beneath the in- 
scription. The first part of the sermon is a proclamation 
of the God who was not discerned by the Athenians. 
The second part is a deduction from the first. If there 
is one God who made heaven and earth and all the races 
of men then all are related to Him, and should repent 
and seek His favor. This declaration he clinched by 
reference to one of the Greek poets, Aratos of Soli in 
Cilicia, in the third century before Christ, who said, 
"For we are His offspring." The same sentence is 
found in the hymn of Cleanthes to Jupiter. The Athen- 

1 Meyer's Commentar}'. 



26 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

ians had glimpses of the truth concerning God and of the 
consequent unity and brotherhood of the race, but those 
glimpses were so dim as to exercise little influence on 
character. They were half truths, not the truth. 

Robert Browning's "Cleon," a part of which has 
already furnished us an important lesson, also illustrates 
the subject at the head of this chapter. We have pre- 
viously observed the emphasis which Browning placed 
upon the truth that if men ever realize their possible 
destiny it must be revealed to them in terms of life. In 
other words, God Himself must manifest His purpose in 
ways intelligible to human understanding. After the 
brief but vital passage which touches on incarnation as 
essential to revelation, we come to the heart of the poem. 
Cleon writes : 

'■'■ Thou askest . . . 
Whether I fear death less than dost thyself, 
The fortunate of men? ' For ' (writest thou) 
' Thou leavest much behind, while I leave naught. 
Thy life stays in the poems men shall sing. 
The pictures men shall study ; while my life, 
Complete and whole now in its power and joy, 
Dies altogether with my brain and arm, 
Is lost indeed; since what survives myself ? 
The brazen statue to o'erlook my grave. 
Set on the promontory whicli I named. 
And that — some supple courtier of my heir 
Shall use its robed and sceptred arm, perhaps, 
To fix the rope to, which best drags it down. 
I go then ; triumph thou, who dost not go ! ' " 

Thus we are introduced to the question of the ages, 
" If a man die, shall he live again? " That pagan king 
feared death. He thought when he died nothing of him 
would remain because he possessed nothing but temporal 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 27 

power. He even envied the poet whose songs would be 
sung and pictures studied when his body should be dust. 

'■^ In man there 's failure, only since he left 
The lower and inconscious forms of life. 
. . . We struggle, fain to enlarge 
Our bounded physical recipiency. 
Increase our power, supply fresh oil to life. 
Repair the waste of age and sickness : no. 
It skills not! life's inadequate to joy, 
..... agree, 

king ! with thy profound discouragement, 

Most progress is most failure ; thou sayest well." 

This terrible sadness continues through a score or 
more of lines, and then nature begins to assert itself : 

'^ I, I the feeling, thinking, acting man, 
The man who loved his life so overmuch, 
Sleep in my urn. It is so horrible, 

1 dare at times imagine to my need 
Some future state revealed to us by Zeus, 
Unlimited in capability 

For joy, as this is in desire for joy. 

To seek which, the joy hunger forces us : 

. . . . But no ! 

Zeus has not revealed it; and alas, 

He must have done so were it possible ! " 

Little did Cleon dream that at that very time the life 
beyond death was being preached, and that there was 
even then in G-reece one who had seen Him over whom 
death had no power. 

" , . . Farewell. And for the rest, 
I cannot tell thy messenger aright 
Where to deliver what he bears of thine 
To one called Faulus : we have heard his fame ; 



28 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

Indeed if Christus be not one with him — 

I know not, nor am troubled much to know, 

Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew 

As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 

Hath access to a secret shut from us ? 

Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king. 

In stooping to inquire of such an one, 

As if his answer could impose at all ! 

He writeth, doth he? Well, and he may write. 

Oh, the Jew findeth scholars ! certain slaves 

Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ 

And (as I gathered from a bystander) 

Their doctrine could be held by no sane man." 

Thus the poem ends. In it Robert Browning has 
given expression to the longing for religious certainty 
which was evident in the whole heathen world ; to the 
desire for knowledge about God ; to the feeling that, if 
He exists, He must in some way manifest Himself ; to 
the deep and constant hunger of the soul to know 
whether death ends all, and to the self-confidence which 
so often shuts the eyes to the light when the day really 
dawns. 

The poem and the sermon on Mars Hill agree in recog- 
nizing that the Athenians had some truth. They were 
not in total darkness. They were in night, but the stars 
were shining. Those altars to an unknown god indi- 
cated a conviction of the reality of the invisible powers, 
and were symbols of the longing of the race for God. 

Other altars have borne witness to the same fact. On 
Salisbury plains is Stonehenge, more marvellous than the 
Gothic splendor of the cathedral near by. In the centre 
of that solemn relic of ancient days is an altar. What 
does it signify ? That in some ruder time men believed 
in God and feared Him. Unknown He was, or to Him 
human beings would never have been sacrificed ; but the 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 29 

hearts of men reached beyond their ignorance and said, 
" He must exist." Wherever men have begun to think 
they have cried : " Oh, that I knew where T might find 
Him ! " That cry indicates possession of a fraction of 
the truth about the Deity. 

The sermon of Paul revolves around the hunger of the 
soul for God. The dominant thought of Eobert Brown- 
ing's poem is the equally persistent craving for knowl- 
edge concerning what follows death. Can life be " in- 
adequate to joy," and there be no sphere in which joy is 
possible ? Is it true that " most progress is most 
failure " ? What terrible pathos lurks in the question, 
" If a man die, shall he live again ? " When has it not 
been asked ? Is there nothing for us but struggle, heart- 
ache, disappointment, a little gladness, and then a narrow 
space in the cold earth forever ? Protus asked Cleon 
whether a poet feared death as much as a king ; and the 
poet answered that he had reason to fear it more. The 
heart says, " I dare imagine some future state revealed 
to us ; " but cold, hard fact simply says, " Zeus has not 
revealed it." 

The subjects central in the sermon and the poem are 
the poles around which the history of the world has re- 
volved. 

The Athenians whom Paul addressed had a half 
truth ; the poet who speaks through Browning's words 
had also part of a truth : his whole nature declared 
that life did not end at the grave, and yet, because he had 
no surer evidence, he heeded not the inner voice. 

Half truths prove the truth. The crescent, as well as 
the moon at its full, shows that the moon exists. After 
a voyage of storm and fog the clouds lift and the hills of 
Ireland appear. Only a small part is seen, but the voy- 
ager could not be more confident that land has been 



30 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

sighted if he saw the whole " green isle." When Colum- 
bus sought the new world his companions became dis- 
couraged and clamored for home. He kept them from 
turning back until drift-wood was seen on the waters : 
they Avere then as sure of the new continent as if they 
had seen it. Twenty miles at sea is a lighthouse. The 
line of rocks is out of sight, but the lighthouse sends its 
gleams far into the night ; and in fog the sound of its bell 
never ceases. The mariner knows where he is and what 
to do because of the light and the bell. 

The crescent is only a part of the moon ; Ireland's 
coast-line is but a hint of Ireland ; drift-wood is not 
much like the new world; and a lighthouse does not 
resemble a long line of concealed rocks : these are only 
parts of truths, but they prove that reality lies behind 
them. 

The same principle holds in the moral and spiritual 
spheres. 

As soon as men begin to think, they face the idea of 
God. It is imperfect — only a vast shadow 5 but where 
there is shadow there must be substance. Where did the 
thought of God first come from ? When did it appear ? 
There are indications that men have always had glimpses 
of a supreme power or person. The savage sees a spirit 
in the storm ; in lightning, the flashing of an eye ; and 
he hears a voice in reverberating thunder. Cicero said 
that what has been believed always and everywhere is 
the voice of the gods. A traveller catching sight of the 
spires of Cologne Cathedral knows that there is something 
great there, although he little dreams of the forests of 
pillars and statues which rise in sculj^tured splendor 
beneath. And we who everywhere see suggestions of love 
lifted above the wretchedness and ignorance of human 
life are sure that within the darkness is a Person. 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 31 

The same reasoning applies to the idea of duty. The 
people never existed who did not believe that they ought 
to do right and ought not to do wrong ; but the questions 
"What is right?" and "What is wrong?" have had 
widely different answers. The Hindoo mother thought 
it was right to throw her babe to the river-god ; the 
Spartans thought it right to steal and wrong to be found 
out; the Druids offered human sacrifices. Is there, 
then, no right ? Because ideals of duty differ, is truth 
a dream ? The Hindoo mother had only half the truth : 
she was right in thinking she ought to obey the unseen 
powers, but wrong in what she believed was required by 
them. The Chinese are right in honoring their ancestors, 
but they have not yet caught sight of the truth that God 
is the Father of all. Men know that they ought to do right, 
therefore there is such a thing as right. A dozen soldiers 
hear an order to charge ; they go ahead, each one doing 
what he is trained to do. Because they act differently, 
it does not follow that no order has been given. Men 
hear the voice of conscience saying, " Do right," and go 
in a thousand different directions ; which only means 
that each is loyal to his own moral sense — as he ought 
to be. Different ideals of duty but emphasize the fact 
that beneath all of them is a unity in which they 
cohere. 

And now we approach the subject of life beyond the 
grave. The doctrine in some form has always and every- 
where been held. The Egyptians believed it ; so did the 
Greeks, the Romans, the ancient dwellers in Mexico, and 
the American Indians. 

Cleon said : 

" I dare at times imagine to my need 
Some future state revealed to us." 



32 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

An inner voice declares that we were made for some- 
thing better than death. That voice will not be silenced. 
We make our philosophies and talk about returning to 
the All, as do flowers, leaves, forests ; but the voice within 
says, " It cannot be." We hear the matchless music of 
Beethoven's symphonies and ask, " Will that music live 
and thrill for a thousand years, even though Beethoven 
has long since returned to dust ? " Is the man less than 
his art ? We look into the face of the Sistine Madonna 
and inquire, " Can Ave believe that that painting has won 
admiration for three centuries, while he who painted it 
has long since ceased to exist ? " Was Raphael more 
ephemeral than the colors he mixed ? This question 
contains one-half the truth concerning immortality. It 
is man crying, " I cannot die ; " there is lacking only the 
response of the Divine voice, " Thou shalt never die." 

It is impossible to think of an object unlike anything 
which ever existed. The mind never actually creates. 
Imaginations are but reflections of realities. 

There have been in all ages and among all nations ideas 
of God, of duty, of life unhindered by death : where did 
they come from ? These thoughts, however faint, prove 
that behind each half truth is a corresponding truth. 

" Our little systems have their day, 
They have their day, and cease to be ; 
They are but broken lights of Thee, 
And thou, O Lord, art more than they." 

Half truths and no more leave us in darkness. The 
Athenian idea of an unknown God left room for the 
doctrine of many gods. In all the streams were 
nymphs, in all the trees were dryads ; there was a god 
for the sea, another for war, another for love ; highest 
of all was Zeus, and all the deities were at last subject 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 33 

to the fateS; so that it is difficult to say what the Greek 
theology really was. The faith was full of poetry; it 
glorified nature ; it did not lack reverence, but it lacked 
conscience. Its votaries lived among glorious hills, 
beside swift rivers, near the " far-resounding sea," 
beneath tender skies, and in a climate that wooed to 
constant dreams. There was in their religion no clear 
idea of an Almighty who ruled in justice, and would 
surely cause holiness to prevail. They thought of 
themselves as possible friends, or enemies, of a thou- 
sand divinities. They had a hint of the fact that they 
were the offspring of G-od, but there they halted and 
the result was sensualism. 

Turn now to Browning's poem. Cleon felt within him- 
self the thrills of immortal life. When his soul had a 
chance to assert itself, it cried, " I must live, aud con- 
tinue to sing, and paint, and build, and make glad the 
hearts of men ; " but then the darkness closed, and, from 
the dream-tower that he had climbed, he cried : 

'< . . . But alas! 
The soul now climbs it just to perish there. 
. . . I . . . agree, 
O king, with thy profound discouragement, 
Who seest the wider but to sigh the more, 
Most progress is most failure ; thou sayest well." 

We are made to live, yet are condemned to die : this 
was the conclusion of those who had no clear revelation 
of God, and no light on the future, except the longing of 
their own hearts. 

In a sense it is true that those who have only half 
truth are no better than those who have none. And yet 
we must discriminate, for no one has more than a partial 
view of anything. It is not the fractional view which 



does the harm, but mistaking that half for the whole. 
The spirit of man is always more than what he pos- 
sesses. Many of the most heroic souls have had limited 
knowledge. Men of action require intensity rather than 
largeness of vision. The question of how we use what 
light we have is more important than the amount which 
has dawned upon us. 

Those who hold a part of a truth firmly, except in rare 
cases, make up for lack of vision by positiveness of con- 
viction. The bigots of all ages have been those who were 
true to what they saw, and yet who saw but little. 
They have had glimpses of justice and none of love, or 
of love and not of justice. They are usually good, but 
seldom do good. Enthusiasts have wide visions, and are 
filled with great inspirations, but fanatics and bigots 
usually compensate for lack of knowledge by dogmatic 
assertion. The larger the view of God and the universe 
the finer and sweeter the life, and the nobler and more 
inspiring the influence. 

Most men hold to half truths instead of the truth be- 
cause they are not willing to learn. Protus had heard of 
Paul and Christ, and had asked his learned friend con- 
cerning them. The king, realizing that he had nothing but 
power, was willing to turn to any one who could give him 
knowledge. The poet and philosopher disdained to receive 
light from the only source from which it could come : 

"• Thou canst not think ti mere bai'barian Jew, 
As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 
Hath access to a secret shut from us ? " 

New truth comes only to the open mind. I would 
rather be a heathen with mind and heart open than a 
Christian with the windows of my soul closed. Paul 
preached in Athens the doctrine of the eternal Father- 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 60 

hood, of resurrection and life, and some mocked, and 
others said, " We will hear you again." Cleon heard a 
divine voice in his soul declaring that he ought not to 
die, but he Avould not heed the message because it came 
from a " barbarian Jew.*' 

There is a light which lighteth every man which 
cometh into the world. Plato, Epictetus, Marcus Aure- 
lius, and thousands of others have Avalked by that light. 
Those who have truly sought have found what they 
most needed to know. Something in every soul speaks 
of God, duty, and immortality. In all lands and times 
many have been true to the primal revelation. The 
condition of knowledge is willingness to learn. The 
last word has not been spoken concerning any great sub- 
ject. Truth does not change, but human apprehension and 
expression of it ought daily to be adjusted to the new con- 
ditions. We should say to all men, to all books, to all 
nature, " If you can tell me anything of God, of myself, of 
duty, or of the hereafter, bring me your message ! " If 
the Athenians had done this they would not have scorned 
Paul. If Cleon had done this he might have found peace 
at the hands even of a "barbarian Jew." If the church 
of E-ome had done this she would never have put her 
hand on Galileo, or sent Giordano Bruno to the stake. 
If we, in our time, would do this we should say to all 
heroic and consecrated investigators in all fields of in- 
quiry : " We have no theories to exploit ; we desire only 
truth, let it come whence it will." 

I am persuaded that we are on the eve of a day of 
great spiritual disclosures. The unknown is constantly 
opening its depths. The miraculous is becoming natural. 
No one would be surprised if the elixir of life were to be 
found and death forever banished. What next ? We 
stand before the tremulous curtain which separates from 



36 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 

the unseen universe, and would not greatly wonder if it 
should rise and reveal visions of which, as yet, we have 
not dreamed. Never was there more need of the open 
heart and submissive will than now. 

If Paul were to return to the earth he would see that 
his doctrine of God has turned the kingdoms of the 
world upside down. It is not France of which Germany 
is afraid, but the doctrine of Paul on Mars Hill. It was 
not the mob that overthrew the Empire in France, 
but the doctrine of Paul on Mars Hill. If Cleon were 
to return, would he call Paul " a barbarian Jew " ? 
and say of Jesus, " His doctrine could be held by no 
sane man " ? He who is willing to learn finds truth. 
He who shuts his mind, whether he be orthodox Chris- 
tian or heathen philosopher, is sure to shut the light 
out, and with it the freedom and peace which come with 
truth. 

What is truth ? Pilate's sneer has long been the 
world's inquiry. The answer of the Christian's Master 
is, " I am the truth." So far as He is yet understood, 
have the life, teaching, and influence of the Christ justi- 
fied His claims ? Is He the truth ? There is only one 
test. Does He satisfy the needs of the human soul ? 
Does the deep within respond to the deep without ? 

Is Jesus Christ the truth concerning God? Can there 
be a more satisfying conception of Deity than this ? — In 
infinity and eternity He is revealed in Jesus Christ, who 
was full of love, tender as a mother, sympathizing with 
the needy and outcast, a being whose essential nature 
impels Him to bind up the broken-hearted, heal diseases, 
forgive sins, and cause all things to work toward bless- 
ing. The transcendent and immanent Deity of the 
theologians, the absolute and unconditioned of the phi- 
losophers, in all that concerns His relations to His crea- 



SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 37 

tiires is manifested in Jesus Christ-. This is tlie first 
principle of the Christian revelation. 

Is Jesns Christ the truth concerning duty? He said: 
Love God with all thy heart, and love one another as I 
have loved you. He said, " Whatsoever 3^e would that 
men should do to you, do ye even so to them." Is there 
one sin or vice, one social or moral disorder which would 
not be banished from the earth if His rule of love were 
to be obeyed ? Has any philosophy of ethics ever gone 
deeper than this sentence of the Apostle, " Love is the 
fulfilling of the law " ? 

Is Jesus Christ the truth concerning what lies beyond 
the ^^rave ? He was buried ; death did not hold Him ; 
He arose in a form which human eyes recognized, and 
held communion with his old companions. In all things 
He was the type of humanity, He was the perfect Man ; 
and therefore, as in His life and death He reveals God 
descending to man, so also in His resurrection He shows 
man rising to communion with other spirits in the land 
where there is no death. 

Did Jesus Christ reveal all that will ever be known of 
God ? This we cannot believe. With the advance of 
science and the enlargement of experience, new ideals 
of right and wrong will be uplifted. The standards will 
rise as life expands. "And He has not told us very 
much about the future ! " No, but He has furnished the 
light we need to live by, and our true course is to keep 
close to Him, waiting for further revelations. 

Do you say, " You have painted a beautiful picture, 
one that would satisfy if it were only true " ? That is 
the very point of my argument. Because the Christian 
revelation does satisf}^, because it answers the eager and 
irrepressible voices of the soul, because it meets the uni- 
versal human longing with all that any need to know 



/I- 



88 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. '^ 

of God, duty, destiny, I insist that it is worthy to be 
trusted. There is no other court of apjjeal ; if this 
does not certify truth then the race must remain forever 
in darkness. 

The address of Paul and the poem of Browning em- 
phasize great thoughts : Half truths prove the truth, as 
the shadow the substance. Those who are content with 
half truths might almost as well be in total darkness. 
He who would know much of spiritual things must keep 
his mind open. In our search for reality we are not left 
to ourselves, we have the truth embodied in a Person, 
and the race will always have the Spirit of Truth, who 
forever and forever will lead into all truth. We move 
on toward the future with music in our hearts and a 
song on our lips, because we believe in our Father, God, 
our Saviour, Christ, and in an immortality of constant 
growth and ceaseless joy. 



0^ 



